


New York, New York

by octaviablimp



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Artist Steve Rogers, Childhood Friends, Fighting, High School AU, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Jewish Bucky Barnes, M/M, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, but bucky left, emancipated minor, fighter bucky, hey we can't all cope in a healthy way, like with fists, no beta we die like men, now he's back!, pierce is a sack of shit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-13 21:07:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29285022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/octaviablimp/pseuds/octaviablimp
Summary: Bucky Barnes, freshly emancipated minor, is in Brooklyn for the first time since elementary school and is ready to start the last semester of high school, his knuckles bruised, and his coping mechanisms decidedly unhealthy. And also Steve's there.orBucky is back in New York for his last semester of senior year, and man is he fucked. Featuring: love, Steve Rogers, Clint being a G, Bucky trying to get his shit together, and run on sentences disguised as part of my writing style.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Kudos: 6





	New York, New York

**Author's Note:**

> Hey! This is my first fic on ao3, so please, be gentle. Drop of a comment if you'd like! That'd be dope as hell, but most importantly, enjoy! 
> 
> cw; the f-slur is used a little ways in, and there is depicted homophobia in this chapter. this won't be the vibe for the rest of the fic, promise.

It is two in the morning the night before Christmas Eve, or Christmas Eve morning, Bucky supposes. He doesn’t celebrate Christmas, but he feels like the fact it’s Christmas Eve should mean something, separate it out from the monotony of all the other days in the year, but the only thing that differentiates this two in the morning from all the other two in the mornings is that Bucky is drunk and wandering through Brooklyn. The air is cold, but not biting, and the only thing illuminating his path down the sidewalk are the flickering street lights that cast a yellow hue onto the freshly fallen snow. New York, for once, is quiet, as if the city decided to take a break, just for one night, one hour, one minute, or one moment. Bucky is unsure how long the silence will last. He has a feeling deep in his stomach, the kind of feeling you get when you’re hungry, but not starving, that this is all desperately familiar. He thinks it’s nostalgia, but he never expected it to hurt this much. He is back in the city for the first time since elementary school, and it feels desperately like home, like the thing he has been searching for and finally found. He hears sirens vaguely in the distance and the moment is broken, but Bucky’s lips almost unconsciously curve upward into a smile despite everything. He takes a swig from the bottle hidden within the brown paper bag clutched in his hand, triumphantly. This, for once, is not about Pierce, he shuts his eyes and shakes his head, this is not about Pierce, he’s free from that piece of shit. This is about coming home, and feeling at home. About breathing in the vaguely polluted air of Brooklyn and listening to the sirens in the distance, he nods. He feels more like himself than he has in years.

The moment ends, and he sighs. There is nothing he would like more than to lie down in the middle of the sidewalk, feel the snow soak his clothes, and let himself become Brooklyn and Brooklyn become him. He figures that eventually the pavement would just absorb him, that seems like a law of physics. Instead of laying down he just shuts his eyes and shakes his head, this is not helpful thinking. He can’t simply be absorbed by the pavement, his life if finally his own, and he has to live it, at the very least out of spite. So he continues his shamble down the street, trying to focus on the crunch of snow under his boots, or the way his frozen hair hangs in his face.

He’s so inside his head that he doesn’t notice the raised voices until he’s passing them. They’re hard to notice too, edged into a dark corner next to the steps of a brownstone, a bigger guy, his blonde hair buzzed, pressing a smaller guy with spiky hair up against the red brown bricks of the house. They’re both probably around Bucky's age, late teens. The bigger guy looks mad, and the smaller one looks vaguely wild, but not scared, Bucky notes. He stops, and watches.

“Oh, so that’s what it is, you’re a cocksucker, huh?” The bigger guy sneers, lip curling up as he stares down the guy.

“Oh Brock, only for you.” Shoots back the guy faux-sweetly, giving a wry smile to the guy in front of him, Brock, Bucky would assume, and Brock’s look of disgust grows.

Bucky wonders if Brock has actually ever been in a fight, as his punch could be seen coming from a mile away, he's surprised the smaller guy doesn’t duck, because he obviously saw it too, given the way he tensed up. The punch connects solidly with his nose though, and the kid flattens against the wall, his hand coming up to his nose as his eyes begin to water against his will. He pulls his hand away from his nose, and still looks at Brock, then spits. It lands squarely on Brocks cheek, and Bucky lets out a chuckle at the sheer absurdity of it, this smaller guy standing up to a guy who looks like he’s destined for the NFL, you’ve gotta admire that shit. Brock wipes the pink tinted spit off his face and shakes his hand out by his side, then turns his back to the kid to look at Bucky.

“What you lookin’ at?” Brock says, his lip curling up as he surveys Bucky’s clothes and the clenched bottle within the brown bag in his fist, probably taking him for homeless. Bucky panics, then smirks, well, he’s in it now. Time to spout some incoherent shit, and hope it ends in a fight. He’d never pass up the opportunity to deck a douchebag.

“Nothing, just watching the show. Think you’re gonna pick it up? I mean I’m all for foreplay, but this does seem a bit excessive.” Bucky sets his wine bottle on the snow, gently.

“So you’re a faggot, too? Should’ve guessed.” Brock snarls. Bucky flinches, tries to mask it, but from the sadistic smile the guy sends him, he obviously didn’t do a good enough job. Bucky tries to think of a comeback, but his booze fogged brain comes up blank, so instead he falls back on his failsafe plan in all situations. He swings at the guy, and feels his lips subtly turning upward as his left fist connects with the guy's right cheek, and the way it gives underneath it. More than expected, he notes. Brock grunts and stumbles backward, hitting the wall, narrowly missing the smaller guy.

“You motherfucker.” The guy starts, but Bucky closes the distance between them, thankful that Brock is as unskilled as he is, the booze is still messing with Bucky’s mind, and it’s called a depressant for a reason. He’s moving much slower than he’d like to be, but he hopes adrenaline will make up the difference.

But by the time Bucky's reached him Brock has steadied himself and even though Bucky sees the punch coming from a mile away his reflexes are too dampened to dodge it, it hits him in the solar plexus, making him stumble backwards and land with a thud on the ground, suddenly coughing and struggling for air. He forgets about Brock for a second as he tries to gain his breath back, staring at the sky breathing like he would during a panic attack. He can feel the snow soaking the back of his sweatshirt. He thinks back to earlier and sinking into Brooklyn.

The kick comes out of nowhere and jars him even more, and he rolls on his side, coughing out a labored breath. The snow pressing into his face, no longer a passive bystander, but aggressive, scraping at his cheek. And Bucky is faced with the realization that this is a fight he cannot win, at least not while drunk.

Brock steps over him, his feet coming into view in front of Bucky’s face, and he sees his opening. He shoots his arm out, snaking it around the guys leg, then twisting, in one fluid motion, Brock is on the ground, and Bucky is brought back to afternoons in August and the smell of red athletic mats, and the way the sun looked streaming through the windows. Bucky shuts his eyes and shakes his head, scrambling to his feet, snatching the wine from where he dropped it, and smashing it against the wall, lamenting the loss of five-dollar wine as the bottom of the bottle shatters, leaving it jagged and dangerous. He catches the eye of the smaller guy who’d been observing this whole time, and for the first time the guy looks wary, scared even, staring at Bucky and the jagged bottle. Bucky catches his eye and sends him what he hopes is a comforting smile. As Brock struggles back to his feet he looks from Bucky, to the bottle, back at Bucky again, then holds his hands up.

“I… I don’t want any trouble, okay? Just was having some fun with my pal, Clint.” Bucky lunges forward, close enough to the guy to scare him, but not close enough to actually stab him. Brock jumps backwards, and then takes off running down the sidewalk, his feet sliding against the snow in his haste. Bucky sighs and slumps as soon as the guy is far enough away for him not to be a threat.

He grabs the paper bag and begins to collect the shards of the bottle, slowing, careful not to cut himself. His vision is blurring and he can barely maneuver his fingers towards the shards. He forgets the other guy, Clint, he supposes, is there, until he bends down to help Bucky, collecting the smaller pieces embedded in the snow, and grabbing the ones Bucky can’t make his hand grab. He passes them to Bucky as they both straighten up, happy that they’ve collected all the pieces.

They stare at each other, Bucky actually taking in the guy this time, spiky hair, a baggy purple sweatshirt, not threatening at first glance, but Bucky's mistakenly made that assumption too many times to be sure. The guy holds out his hand, as if they’re in an office, not in the shadow of the steps of a brownstone, both of them adrenaline filled and bleeding.

“Clint Barton, you?” His voice is nice, softer than is appropriate for the forwardness of the gesture, but it’s two am, so he thinks it makes sense.

“James.” He says shortly, not giving a last name as the adrenaline is drains out of his veins, and making it hard not to slur his words.

“Uh…” Clint starts awkwardly, “Thanks? I suppose? I’m not often speechless, to be honest, but I don’t really know what to say in this situation.” Bucky chuckles, or tries his best to, he stops himself mid-way through as his ribs start protesting.

“Me neither to be honest, but you’re welcome I suppose, what a douchebag.”

“Yeah, right? Hate-crimes are so 2010’s.” Bucky smiles in agreement, but doesn’t know how to respond, the adrenaline finally wearing off and the booze muddying up his thoughts again. “Should we…” Clint seems again at a loss for words, “Do you need to go to the hospital?” Bucky almost laughs, then remembers he’s supposed to be a normal person, and normal people don’t get in fights then scoff at the idea of getting medical help. He shakes his head,

“No,” Bucky hesitates, “Do you?”

“No, I think I’m fine. It’s pretty late, we should probably head home?” Clint says it more as a question, as if he isn’t sure, as if he doesn’t really want to go home, and Bucky sees that little glint of fear that is oh so familiar, and oh so painful. Then, in true Bucky fashion, he does something utterly stupid, because Clint seems trustworthy, and of course Bucky’s gut feelings are _always_ right. He thinks of his mother, and Sitwell, and Pierce, then shuts his eyes and shakes his head, making his decision.

“Yeah, probably.” They both stand there, neither wanting to move. “Do you, do you want to come home with me?” Clint raises his eyebrow in a way that is far too suave for what Bucky knows of the guy. “No, shit, not like that, I’m not gay! Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Of course not, just, fuck, wait,” His thoughts are slipping together, and Clint's gaze somehow becomes more skeptical. He takes a deep breath and starts over, “Just, I was wondering if you wanted to stay the night, you uh…” He tries to think of an excuse, “I mean it’s late and you don’t want to wake your parents up, especially looking like that.” Clint takes in the words, and almost looks relieved at the offer. And he must be desperate because he just looks at Bucky, and nods.

“Yeah. That’d be good if you don’t mind.”

“Sure yeah, I’m just a few blocks this way.” He pushes off from the wall, and immediately stumbles, Clint catches his arm, steadying him, a smile already forming, the unsure Clint of earlier, gone.

“Hey wait, what’s wrong with how I look?”


End file.
